Malala Yousafzai: This iron lady’s not for twerking

The idealism of the Pakistani girl shot through the head by the Taliban has
been inspiring

The story of Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani girl shot through the head by the Taliban 12 months ago for daring to speak out on the rights of women, is already the stuff of modern legend.

Last month a painting of her was unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery in London; last week she addressed a global audience in New York on behalf of Bill and Hillary Clinton; and next week, at the age of 16, she will publish her autobiography, I am Malala.

''I want to tell my story,’’ she writes. ''But it will also be the story of the 61 million children who can’t get education. I want it to be part of the campaign to give every sister and brother the right to go to school.’’

In a week when David Cameron was forced to say he was a feminist after all (having lamely ducked the question in a magazine interview with an “um…er”); when singer Miley Cyrus posed naked with a sledgehammer and claimed it was subversive; and when the gender pay gap in Britain was highlighted yet again, who couldn’t fail to be cheered up by a 16-year-old girl in an orange dupatta giving us a spoonful of idealism?

Here she was brushing her hand shyly across her face and, in the same breath, telling America with a cheeky teenage smile that it was about time they had a woman president. What a welcome break from the grown-up, dull-eyed world of PR, commercialism, twittering and twerking and fame-seeking reality television.

It’s exactly a year since Malala first hit the headlines, her shattered body on a stretcher for all to see, after she was shot by Taliban gunmen on her way to school in Mingora, in north-western Pakistan.

The bullet, which passed through her skull and became embedded in her shoulder, was a punishment for the blog that she began writing as an 11-year-old to highlight the repression of women in her region.

Now she is a global symbol and, with her still childish, high-pitched voice, she has not just made us aware of the glaring atrocities in her own Taliban-run culture, but also some of the less-than-perfect aspects of our own world – although respectfully and with all the manners of a very nicely brought up girl. Malala has also been quick to point out the best of Britain and Pakistan, repeatedly thanking the doctors and nurses who saved her life and her hearing along the way.

Yet it’s hard not to feel more than a shudder of anxiety on her behalf when you see the pictures of her with pink teddy bears sent by well-wishers. Modestly she describes herself as “just one girl among many”. But the weight of expectation on Malala is enormous, with many predicting already that she will one day be the prime minister of Pakistan.

When she was painted by the artist Johnny Yeo, he showed her finishing her homework. Yeo was struck by her diffidence and schoolgirl innocence. “She didn’t choose to end up as well known as she is,” he said. Ironically, it is this that makes her portrait stand out in stark contrast as it hangs alongside those of David Cameron and Lady Gaga.

In a world of shiny, attention-grabbing celebrities in pink PVC pants, and politicians who are terrified of offending voters, her combination of youth, modesty and idealism, make Malala one classy classless act.

What she demonstrates above all is that anyone who truly believes in equality, and has nearly paid with their life for it, does not think twice about defining it, and that the genuinely subversive lead not by public relations, but by inspiration.

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How I’ve been turned on to Bake Off

Coming late to The Great British Bake Off feels like being invited to the reception party, but not the wedding.

There’s a tranche of references from earlier series about Soapy’s soufflé and Ruby’s sweet buns that I’ll never be fully au fait with.

The longer it’s gone on, the more I’ve resisted, which has only compounded the problem. So as series four began and all the knowing Bake Off chit chat took off, I was determined to rise above it, like a perfectly judged Victoria sponge.

But somehow it’s become too overwhelming to ignore and I’ve given in….

Who knew suet could be that gripping? Who expected to get so wound up by a profiterole? How can the glaze on chocolate icing be so compelling? And isn’t great to see women dominating a prime-time show?

But most of all, what a joy Mary Berry is. All that gentle encouragement in the face of the most curdled catastrophe. She even looks like she’s made out of icing, with her little crystal angelica eyes and glacé cherry mouth.

Best of all, her commentary reads like a subliminal philosophy for life: ''Everybody’s cloth is special’’; ''Even when I get a recipe, I decide I’m going to do something else’’; and most reassuringly of all: ''Keep it light’’.

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Let the state run our state schools

Iam the product of a reassuringly mediocre Eighties comprehensive school education, not dissimilar to David Walliams’s and Catherine Tate’s Big School. (Our Chemistry teacher watched Neighbours in the Bunsen burner cupboard, leaving us to mix Ribena and hydrochloric acid cocktails and carve the names of Duran Duran on the wooden benches.) And to me the gap between the private and state sector has always seemed to be a chasm.

Now, as a part-time teacher and a parent in North London, possibly the most divided educational landscape in the universe, I’m even more aware of the aching distance between the star-gazing “posh” kids and those fending for themselves.

So this week’s call from Sir Michael Wilshaw that private schools do more for the state sector struck a chord.

But isn’t the Ofsted chief playing the class card here to detract from the real issues on state education? While private schools can bask in small classes of selected students, those in the public sector are dealing with greater challenges.

It takes more than a fancy motto and a first-class ability to conjugate Latin verbs, as one major public school discovered when the academy it was sponsoring in Wiltshire ran into crisis.

Surely the government, rather than Eton, is supposed to be running our schools. Although, come to think of it, who can tell the difference?

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When 40 winks is the best therapy

Congratulations to Claire Danes for discovering what the British have known for generations.

The cure for existential angst, morbid self-doubt and overwhelming anxiety is not always a very expensive course of therapy.

Sometimes, it is just a good old-fashioned nap.

Danes, 34, who stars as the angst-ridden, obsessive CIA agent in Homeland, attributes her newfound faith in a bit of “zzzz” rather than “a lot of therapy” to her appreciation of British reserve.

She is married to the English actor Hugh Dancy, who introduced her to the art of snoozing.

“I’m from the land of therapy, and I love it. Therapy is great,’ says Danes, in next month’s Vogue.

“But Hugh really helped me discover that, a lot of the time, I’m just tired. I don’t have to go through this labyrinthine explanation. There doesn’t have to be that much back story. I can just be in need of a nap.”

As a naturally gifted and knowledgeable “napper”, I can reassure Danes there is scientific evidence to back up the case for a snooze. Research among pilots shows that a 26-minute “Nasa nap” in flight (presumably the co-pilot takes over) enhances alertness by 54 per cent.

Maybe someone should mention that to Carrie, her exhausted Homeland counterpart.